Source: US News & World Report
“Maria Ponomarenko, a journalist from Siberia serving a six-year prison sentence for speaking out against the war in Ukraine, has declared a hunger strike, according to her publication and a supporter. The 46-year-old was detained less than two months after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine in 2022 for accusing the Russian air force of bombing a theatre in the Ukrainian city of Mariupol. She was found guilty last February of spreading false information about the Russian military by a court in her hometown of Barnaul in western Siberia. More than 20,000 people have been arrested across Russia for speaking out against the war, according to rights monitor OVD-Info. While most of those detained are fined and soon released, independent journalists often receive harsher treatment by courts.” (09/17/24)